


Caught Somewhere in Time

by el_gilliath



Series: Rewinding Time [2]
Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-12-30 03:21:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18307145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/el_gilliath/pseuds/el_gilliath
Summary: The air smells warm as Alex slowly wakes up.





	Caught Somewhere in Time

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from Iron Maiden.
> 
> I wasn't originally planning on continuing this but then this happened. So yeah. Possible Series on my hands.

The air smells warm as Alex slowly wakes up. It always does. Warm, dusty, sweaty and kind of stale. Baghdad isn’t the friendliest of places to begin with, the dessert heat and sandy fields makes it even less so.

He takes a deep breath and stretches out on his bed. He knows he has to get up and do stuff soon but being a Captain does give him a slight advantage in that he can be lazy for a little while if he wants too. Besides, he doesn’t want to let go of his dream just yet. Dreaming about Michael and their first date is one of the few things his dad and all the trauma related to that can’t take away from him. Besides, seeing Michael in his dream always calms him down since the date changes every time. As if he’s running through scenarios in his head about what they could do. This time they still met at the museum, but instead of staying there they drove out to Foster Ranch in Michael’s shitty old Chevy. Michael had packed a picnic basket of all things and they spent the night under the start, a blanket under them on the bed of Michael’s truck, exchanging hot and heavy kisses in between playing guitar, talking and generally enjoying their time together. 

It felt like he was actually there, back in Roswell with Michael, far away from the humid heat of the base in Baghdad. He takes another deep breath and allows himself a rare smile thinking about his high school… Michael. His high school Michael. The boy that let him be unapologetically himself, piercings, eyeliner, nail polish and all. Who let him play guitar, let him be a sarcastic little shit and who loved him for it.

If he’s honest with himself; He misses that. He misses Michael. He misses being in his arms and kissing him. Periodically dreaming about him and their first date doesn’t really help that. It doesn’t help at all. But he still loves those dreams, because they are so real and so true. And it helps knowing that Michael is fine. Maria mentions him hanging out at the Pony every now and then when he talks to her, and though he wonders why Michael never went for that scholarship at UNM, at least he knows that he is safe.

“Captain Manes, you awake?” 

“Give me a minute Alvarez” he replies to the young Lieutenant outside his door. He hears the “Yes Sir” before the Lieutenant moves away. Which means that he needs to get up and at them. The computers don’t wait for anyone, especially not Captains dreaming about their ex-somethings from high school.

\----------

When he’s in the hospital after having his leg blown off from an IED, he dreams of Michael almost every night. Almost as if he’s pulling him in by sheer force of will. Different dates every night. They help until he wakes up again, until he feels the pain in his body, the phantom pain where he’s supposed to have a leg. The rest of the nights he dreams of driving in Iraq, of driving over the IED, of his own screams as his leg is blown away from his body. It fills him with anguish and panic attacks are always around the corner.

But Michael… Michael will always calm him down. Even if he hasn’t seen him in nearly 10 years in person, even if he doesn’t know shit about Michael and his life now. Just thinking about his curls, his gentle, loving smile and the shit eating grin he has the biggest hate/love relationship calms him down to the point where he can concentrate on getting better. On learning how to walk on crutches. And how to handle having a prosthetic leg. He thinks about him when he’s so angry he wants to throw everything through windows, when he’s so sad he sits on the fucking stool in the shower and cries bitter tears where no one can see him, when he’s apathic listening to his father drone on about the good he did for his country and how he is finally a real Manes man.

He thinks about Michael in all the waking moments he needs something safe and good to think about so that he doesn’t go insane. And when he gets told that he’s going home to Roswell, he hopes beyond belief that Michael is there. That he can see him in real life again. He needs to see him, the glorious human being that has gotten him through Iraq, through missing his leg, through all the difficult times in his life since he was 17.

He’s hopeful in a way he hasn’t been in years. Not even living with his father for a little while can put a damper on that.

\----------

Of course when he gets home everything is different. Michael is the town drunk, Kyle is back to being a decent human being, Liz is a tiny bit insane and Jim Valenti left him his cabin. The only thing that hasn’t really changes is Maria. Still too pure for this world in some ways, a hellion in others.

He tries not to let his dad get in his head, but he still manages. And he hurts the one person he has spent years missing over and over again. He doesn’t understand how he can hurt one person this much, and still be fully aware of the fact that he still loves him above all else. He longs back to the dreams of their first date, but he hasn’t had them since he came back to Roswell and it seems like he can’t. Maybe actually seeing Michael again has scrambled his brain enough into remembering how to handle his bullshit without disappearing in a fantasy. 

It doesn’t help.

\----------

He finds the piece of the alien tech in his cabin, he goes to Michael and they talk. Really talk. They admit all their faults, and they come to an understanding. They spend months just being in each other’s company, helping each other figure out who the 4th alien is and what that means. He helps Michael finish the console if he ever wants to leave the planet, even if it hurts his very heart and being to do so. But Michael deserves this, and he has to be free to pick for himself.

In the end. It all comes to a blow. A fight so big that Max and Isobel are on standby in case Michael levels the entire town in the aftermath. But it ends in a whimper and not in a bang. Alex can’t handle any more bangs, he lost his leg in the first one. 

Instead they come together in a soft, but mutually loving kiss. They undress each other with care, the whispers of tentative touches and beautiful caresses between them. Michael doesn’t let him leave his embrace, Alex equally unwilling to leave it. Their love for each other a cosmic thing that both of them are so aware of and in need of. 

After they lie next to each other in the bed at Alex’s cabin just holding each other. There is still so much they have to resolve and a 4th alien they have to deal with. But for now, this is enough, because they are together.


End file.
